Bike Culture in Salta, Argentina

Bike Culture In Salta: What a trip! This city is crazy, really, the traffic is thick like pea soup and

the cars go fast, fast, fast! There isn´t a drop of space for cyclists. The city is colonial and the

streets extremely narrow, but the autos manage go go super fast anyway. It really wins the prize for the WORST CITY I have EVER BIKED IN. However, ironically, it is full of cyclists! Not

thousands but really, many, many more than one would expect considering the terrible conditions.

The cyclists are HEROIC in Salta. I really don´t know how they survive. There is absolutley no respect what-so-ever for cyclists. We felt this as we were almost run over a few times, but it has to be worse for locals because we recieve more respect as

foriegners. But somehow they manage! They are like ants, they squeeze in an out of traffic, they find a space in streets full of cars, they find movement in traffic, they make the impossible possible. They are incredible! Unfortunately, they are almost 100 percent men...

We spoke with a young woman who is a mechanic in a bike shop in central Salta, Mercedes Ganami (cyclesparra@hotmail.com) who told us that before there were a lot more cyclists in the city, using the bike as a means of transportation, but that just in the last 5 years the number of cars and motorcycles has increased hugely and due to this phenomenon Salta is loosing its cyclists rapidly. Hundreds and thousands of cars and motorcycles are taking thier place and filling the city with traffic, noise and smog. Motorcycles more than cars replace bikes because they are cheaper... but not necesarily better. They also pollute a huge amount and there are less regulations surrounding them so someone could have an engine on thier moto that pollutes more than a car and no one would say anything. We´ve seen so many motorcycles in Argentina, and everyone tells us they´ve only appeared in the last 5 years. It´s an amazing phenomenon--the motorcycle replacing the bicycle--and very sad. There´s no greater threat to the bicycle than the moto here in Argentina.

In Salta there are zero organizations working to promote the bicycle as transportation, even though there are many bike enthusiasts. Mercedes thinks this is because they just cannot get along well enough to come together on a project. However, Salta has 3 bikepaths-lanes. Why we asked, because there was a movement of people asking for them? Nope, nothing of the sort, the city decided to install them out of necesity because so many cylists were being killed on the main roads in Salta. Mercedes laughed when I told her I thought that 23 cyclist deaths in one year in New York City was a lot. She told me that Salta would far surpass New York in cyclists deaths, although no statistics are available (no one makes the effort to find them). So, there are some bike paths, but they are in terrible condition! The ones that are separate from the road are full of mountains of dirt and giant holes and the ones that are part of the street are full of cars, and the police don´t care one bit (even though they care a lot when you sit on the grass in main plaza! They kicked us out for sitting on the grass...hehe) Mercedes told us that although mountain biking is an extrememly popular sport in Salta you´ll never see a nice mountain bike in the city, because the people who use the bike as sport wouldn´t dare risk it in the city. Instead, they drive thier bike out to the hills to go biking--in their CARS. Those who use bikes in the city are the working class and most have old beater cruisers.

So the situation for bikers in Salta is... insane. They have to deal with traffic, narrow streets, aggressive and reckless drivers (Mercedes told us the requirements for driving an auto are very loose), and bike paths full of cars and holes. "If it´s so terrible for bikers here, why are do they do it?" I asked. Without hesitation Mercedes told me, "Out of necesity. There are plenty of people with no other option for transportation." It´s same answer I got from a man I met on a bike path. He told me that it´s awful biking in Salta, and not fun at all, but it´s his only option because it´s the cheapest form of transportation and he doesn´t have to be dependent on anyone to get to work and back, just on himself. As the cheapest and most autonomous form of transportation---the bicycle cannot be beat! That is why there are still cyclists in Salta despite the take-over by motorcycles. And why aren´t there more women biking? I asked Mercedes... It´s because it´s so dangerous and women in general have more fear of the streets, she told me. It´s true, you have to be super aggresive to survive the streets of Salta, and in a sexist society few women learn how to have the confidence to be aggressive.

It´s even hard for BMXers in Salta! We were told BMXers are looked down upon by the richer skateboarders. But as we left the city we ran into a dirt BMX racing track in the suburbs and we just had to stop! Cristhian took all his panniers off and we had a fun hour jumping over dirt bumps and playing with the little boys who were also enjoying an evning on the bike track!